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• Most of the wealthiest women billionaires are heiresses
• The net worth of these women is usually tied up in stock or company valuations, not raw cash, like many other rich people
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The existence of billionaires is a sign of a broken and failing society. While more wealth accumulates at the top, those at the bottom are increasingly forced to struggle to make ends meet. They are forced to rent instead of own, borrow instead of invest, and spend their savings instead of saving for retirement.

Unfortunately, this reality shows no sign of changing any time soon. While we can debate the morality of profiting off the suffering of millions of people, we can look at who those people are in the meantime.

Like most industries, most billionaires in the world are men. Out of the 2,781 billionaires in the world, only 369 are women. We are only going to list the top 15 of those women on this list. The combined wealth of these 15 women is about $600 billion. Something interesting about these women is that they are almost exclusively heiresses.

Our sources for this article are CEO World Magazine and Forbes.

Why Are We Talking About This?

The role and usefulness of billionaires in today’s society are increasingly becoming a stressful point of debate. As billionaires amass more wealth and control more of our economy, the decisions we make about them will impact what they do with those companies that make our lives better or worse. Who is in control of your world? Probably a few of the women on this list.

#15 Vicky Safra

• Age: 72
• Net Worth: $7.5 billion individually (18.9 Billion including the fortune of the family)
• Source: Banking
• Country: Greece

Vicky Safra is the richest woman in Greece. She inherited her fortune from her late husband, Joseph Safra, who died in 2020. Joseph was the richest man in Brazil and the richest banker on the planet before his death. He founded the Republic National Bank of New York and Banco Safra, which is now the sixth-largest bank in Brazil.

Vicky has four children who have also inherited significant money from Joseph. Even though she is a citizen of Greece and their family made their fortune in Brazil, she lives in Switzerland.

#14 Diane Hendricks

• Age: 77
• Net Worth: $20.9 Billion
• Source: ABC Supply
• Country: United States of America

The fourteenth wealthiest woman in the world, Diane Hendricks, is the co-founder of ABC Supply, a wholesale building material distributor. ABC Supply has 900 branches and generates $20.4 billion annually. She has a high school diploma, seven children, and still chairs ABC Supply.

#13 Susanne Klatten

• Age: 62
• Net Worth: $23.8 Billion
• Source: BMW, Pharmaceuticals
• Country: Germany

Klatten is the richest woman in Germany and the 50thrichest person in the world. She inherited a majority stake in her father’s pharmaceutical company when he passed away, and she worked to turn it into one of Germany’s largest corporations. She also inherited a significant portion of BMW and owns a handful of other companies.

#12 Iris Fontbona & Family

• Age: 81
• Net Worth: $27.2 Billion
• Source: Mining
• Country: Chile

Iris Fontbona is the beneficiary of her late husband’s fortune. Along with her three sons, she controls Antofagasta Plc and holds the majority stake in Quiñenco. Antofagasta Plc owns Chilean copper mines, and Quiñenco is a banking, beer, and manufacturing conglomerate.

#11 Miriam Adelson & Family

• Age: 78
• Net Worth: $27.7 Billion
• Source: Las Vegas Sands

The eleventh wealthiest woman, Miriam Adelson, and her family own half of the gambling empire in the United States, Macao, and Singapore. She started out as the wife of Sheldon Adelson, who was the former CEO of Las Vegas Sands. She earned a Bachelor of Science from Hebrew University Jerusalem and has 5 children. She is the co-founder of the Sheldon G. Adelson Research Clinic in Las Vegas.

#10 Elaine Marshall & Family

• Age: 82
• Net Worth: $28.4 Billion
• Source: Koch Industries, Investor

The tenth wealthiest woman in the world, Elaine Marshall, resides in Dallas, Texas, and inherited her fortune from her late husband, E. Pierce Marshall. She is the daughter-in-law of J. Howard Marshall II, who was married to Anna Nicole Smith and died in 2007. She currently owns 16% of the Koch Industries conglomerate with two of her children.

#9 Gina Rinehart

• Age: 70
• Net Worth: $30.7 Billion
• Source: Mining
• Country: Australia

Gina Rinehart is an heiress who inherited her fortune from her late father, Lang Hancock, who was the founder of Hancock Prospecting, a mineral extraction company. She is currently in an acquisition into the lithium industry. Besides minerals, she is also the second-largest cattle producer in the country. Two of her children, John and Bianca, have locked her into a lengthy legal battle over the family trust accounts, totaling $5.4 Billion.

#8 Abigail Johnson

• Age: 62
• Net Worth: $31.3 Billion
• Source: Fidelity
• Country: United States of America

The eighth wealthiest woman in the world, Abigail Johnson, took over the CEO position of Fidelity Investments from her father in 2014. Her father founded Fidelity Investments in 1946, and she inherited around 29% stake in the firm. Fidelity Investments manages $4.5 trillion of discretionary assets. She received an MBA from Harvard in 1988.

#7 MacKenzie Scott

• Age: 54
• Net Worth: $33.6 Billion
• Source: Amazon
• Country: United States of America

The seventh wealthiest woman in the world, MacKenzie Scott, is the ex-wife of Amazon founder, Jeff Bezos. She pledged to give away half of her fortune and since 2019 has donated over $17 billion. She issued an open call for nonprofits to apply for an unrestricted grant. She chooses non-profits that so far mostly have to do with social justice, social equity, and education.

#6 Rafaela Aponte-Diamant

• Age: 79
• Net Worth: $35 Billion
• Source: Shipping
• Country: Switzerland

Rafaela Aponte-Diamant is not only the 43rd richest person in the world, but she is also the wealthiest self-made woman. She owns a 50% stake in the MSC (Mediterranean Shipping Company) group, while her husband owns the other half. MSC is the world’s largest shipping line, has over 150,000 employees, and has 675 offices in 155 different countries. Besides shipping, MSC also operates a cruise line, port operations, and inland logistics. She is currently sitting on the board of MSC. She launched the MSC Foundation in 2018, focused on humanitarian and conservation efforts.

#5 Jaqueline Mars

• Age: 84
• Net Worth: $38.5 Billion
• Source: Mars
• Country: United States of America

The fifth wealthiest woman in the world, Jaqueline Mars, is a Mars heiress. Her grandfather founded the company in 1923 and invented the Milky Way bar. Mars is a candy, food, and pet care firm. Jaqueline Mars owns one-third of the company. She worked for Mars for 20 years. She resides in Virginia and currently owns an Olympic horse farm there. 

#4 Savitri Jindal & Family

• Age: 74
• Net Worth: $39.8 Billion
• Source: Jindal Group
• Country: India

Savitri Jindal is the widow of Jindal Group founder, Om Prakash Jindal. She currently chairs the Jindal Group, which is an infrastructure, power, steel, and cement conglomerate. After her husband’s sudden death in 2005, she stepped up as chairperson and led the conglomerate on an even more successful trajectory. Besides being a businesswoman, she got into politics and was elected as a minister in the Bhupinder Singh Hooda government. As a philanthropist, she is focused on lifting the impoverished. She has launched welfare initiatives, medical institutions, and several schools. Jindal has 9 children.

#3 Julia Koch

• Age: 62
• Net Worth: $74.6 Billion
• Source: Koch Industries
• Country: United States of America

The third wealthiest woman in the world, Julia Koch, owns a 42% stake in Koch Industries, which she inherited from her late husband, David. She and her children own a 15% stake in the Brooklyn Nets. She currently serves on three boards of directors: Koch Industries, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.

#2 Alice Walton

• Age: 74
• Net Worth: $82.2 Billion
• Source: Walmart (NYSE:WMT)
  
• Country: United States of America

The second wealthiest woman in the world, and the wealthiest woman in the USA, Alice Walton is an heiress of Walmart co-founder, Sam Walton. Unlike her two siblings, she has never been interested in working for the family empire and served as a children’s clothes buyer briefly in 1971. She has founded the Alice L. Walton School of Medicine and Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. She is currently divorced and resides in Fort Worth, Texas.

#1 Francoise Bettencourt Meyers & Family

• Age: 70
• Net Worth: $99.5 Billion
• Source: L’Oréal
• Country: France

Francoise Bettencourt Meyers is the world’s richest woman. She is the L’Oréal heiress, and her grandfather, Eugéne Schueller founded the company in 1909. She inherited her fortune from her late mother, Liliane Bettencourt. She holds a 35% stake in L’Oréal Group. She was the first woman ever to hold a $100 billion fortune in 2023 and is the 13th wealthiest person in the world. She is also an author and philanthropist. She is the president of the family’s philanthropic organization, the Bettencourt Schueller Foundation, which she co-founded.

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